There's been some community debate about the significance of our record streak in Syracuse without an inch of snow. Some question whether the streak is meaningful or truly "snowless," because we've had a trace or a fraction or an inch from time to time since our last snowfall of any real significance on Feb. 24.

Look, this is Syracuse, home of the Golden Snowball, one of the North American capitals for big city snow. A trace is the stuff that crumbles into water beneath your feet. A trace is not enough to make you brush off your car window ... the wipers or an instant of sunlight get it off. But an inch has significance. If you live here, you know what an inch of snow means. That's when you growl and get out the shovel. That's when you make tough choices about whether to wear shoes or boots. That's when you leave footprints on the porch steps.

An inch is a real snowfall, and we virtually always get an inch in November, at least once or twice.

To have it not happen in November OR March, in the same year, is very strange - as in record-breaking strange ...

And we're still going. We're at 282 days now and counting, six days beyond the old record, which stood for 63 years. We've gone nine months and a solid week without an inch of snow. Chances are, barring absolutely extreme changes in our weather, we may not see anything like this again for the rest of our lives.

Even in a city of wintry extremes, this is extreme - and thus worth noting.